


No Quiet Find

by RosemarysBabysitter (TashaElizabeth)



Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: 80's Boarding School AU, Alternate Universe - Boarding School, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-06-15
Updated: 2014-06-15
Packaged: 2018-02-04 18:43:58
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,042
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1789270
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TashaElizabeth/pseuds/RosemarysBabysitter





	No Quiet Find

“Headmaster Crawford yelled at me again,” Will said, leaning against the frame of Frederick’s open bedroom door. Frederick looked up from the book open on the bed in front of him and smiled. He always smiled when Will showed up, popping into rooms unexpectedly and trailing trouble or gossip.

“Close the door,” he said and Will did, slamming it shut with some hidden aggression and flopping down on Frederick’s roommates bed against the opposite wall. “Where’s Price?” he asked, loosening his tie.

“Family wedding. Lucky bastard gets real food and a private shower for four whole days. Do you want a drink? I think there’s some wine coolers in my desk from that party last weekend.”

Will nodded and Frederick climbed across the narrow, unmade bed to fish a bottle from underneath a semester’s worth of loose Latin translations and poorly taken Trig notes. He passed it to Will and then pulled the heavy, decades old book to him and let it lay open in his knee. “What did he yell at you about?”

Will shrugged, wrenching off the cap and examining the warm blue liquid inside suspiciously. “Fighting.” He took a sip. Grimaced. “Not being social. Causing trouble in class. The usual. I don’t think he likes me.”

“He likes you fine. He just yells at everyone. He yelled at half the fencing team three weeks ago for that thing with that Japanese sword going missing from the history storage room and we didn’t even have anything to do with that.”

“He never yells at you and you fight twice as much as I do.”

“He’s not gonna yell at me,” Frederick said bitterly, putting his chin on his fist and resuming reading. “I’m just lucky to be here, remember?"

Will laughed. “Whatcha reading? Homework?”

“English lit,” Frederick said, pulling a face. “I don’t get it at all. Like what the hell does this mean?” He lifted the book and read aloud in a clear, rich voice.

“Weary with toil, I haste me to my bed,  
The dear repose for limbs with travel tired;  
But then begins a journey in my head  
To work my mind when body’s work’s expired,  
For then my thoughts, from far where I abide,  
Intend a zealous pilgrimage to thee,  
And keep my drooping eyelids open wide,  
Looking on darkness which the blind do see;  
Save that my soul's imaginary sight  
Presents thy shadow to my sightless view,  
Which like a jewel hung in ghastly night  
Makes black night beauteous and her old face new,  
Lo, thus my day my limbs, by night my mind,  
for thee, and for myself, no quiet find.”

Both were silent when the poem ended. Will didn’t meet his eyes. He adjusted his grip on the bottle and took a long drink. 

“Oh,” Frederick said quietly, a hot blush streaking down his neck and under his open collar. “They make more sense out loud I guess.” He looked back at the book and pretended to read it. 

“Fred?” Will asked after a moment. There was a something hot in the air between them. The word hung heavy in the air and both boys sat there, acutely aware of it and of the sounds of each other breathing. “Fred,” Will said again, more quietly. “Are you still praying that I’ll go away?”

Frederick sighed, his eyes fluttering shut momentarily. “I’m not praying that you’ll go away. I’m praying that the way I feel about you will change.”

“So you’re still doing it.” Frederick didn’t answer the question. Will took another drink and let the sweet, fruity liquid stay in his mouth for a long time, swallowing slowly and then running his tongue along the inside of his teeth. Then he spoke. “I guess I understand.”

“I know you understand, Will,” Frederick said, an unconscious smile flaring behind his discomfort. “You always do. That’s what’s so annoying about you."

Will smiled a little, his lips making the shapes of laughter without their sounds. Then he turned his head, still avoiding Frederick’s eyes. “I do understand. And I don’t push things. I don’t make you do anything.”

“Yes.”

Will looked up sharply and met Frederick’s eyes, taking a deep breath. Frederick mimicked him without thinking. Will blinked very hard and blurted out, “Like how Abel Gideon made you give him a blow job behind the chapel two weeks ago?”

Frederick blanched and summoned control by looking back at his literature anthology with a deep and sustained effort. “ _How_ do you know about that?”

“Nobody told me or anything. I’m just good at figuring things out from little pieces.” Will began to pull the paper label off the bottle in small, even strips. “Do you like Abel more than me?”

“Abel Gideon is a staggering asshole.”

“But he’s a senior and he has a car.”

“And a townie girlfriend and a coke problem and he is going to end up in jail and I am going to laugh about it. No. I don’t like Abel Gideon more than you. I don’t like Abel Gideon at all but he didn't make me or anything okay? He just asked me differently.”

“Forcefully?”

“I don’t know. Maybe.” Frederick was gritting his teeth now.

Will scooted to the edge of the bed. He put the bottle down on the floor and then put his hands out like he was going to touch Frederick. Frederick’s shirt sleeves were rolled up to his elbows and Will wanted to put his hands around the widths of Frederick’s forearms. He didn’t. “Do you maybe kind of like it when people ask you forcefully.” Will said 'people' very deliberately and didn’t say ‘guys’. or ‘girls’ Both of them noticed the distinction. ”Like,” Will went on, “if they’re kind of mean to you about it? Because then you don’t have to worry about it or make decisions? You can just feel stuff without thinking about it.”

“I don’t know.” 

“That’s how I think it is, when I think about being you.”

Frederick’s anger receded and the tension in his jaw relaxed. “You think about being me?”

“I like you, Fred.”

“I like you too Will,” Frederick said. He sounded curiously defeated about it. He turned the page in his book. “I like you a lot.”


End file.
